Read The Instant Enemy for Free Online

triggered something in him, something from the past, I don’t know what. We don’t have a complete history on Davy. He lost his parents and spent his early years in an orphanage, until foster parents took him on. Anyway, when I told him what I was going to do, he must have felt abandoned all over again. Only now he was big and strong and ready to kill me. Fortunately I was able to talk him back to his senses. And I didn’t revoke my recommendation for probation.”
    “That took faith.”
    Belsize shrugged. “I’m a faith healer. I learned a good many years ago that I have to take my chances. If I won’t take a chance on them, I can’t expect them to take a chance on themselves.”
    The waitress brought our sandwiches, and for a few minutes we were busy with them. At least I was busy with mine. Belsize picked at his as if Davy and I had spoiled his appetite. Finally he pushed it away.
    “I have to learn not to hope too much,” he said. “I have to school myself to remember that they have two strikes on them before I ever see them. One more and they’re whiffed.” He raised his head. “I wish you’d give me all the facts about Davy.”
    “They wouldn’t make you any happier. And I don’t want you putting out an alarm for him and the girl. Not until I talk to my client, anyway.”
    “What do you want me to do?”
    “Answer a few more questions. If you were high on Davy, why did you recommend six months in jail?”
    “He needed it. He’d been stealing cars on impulse, probably for years.”
    “For sale?”
    “For joy riding. Or grief riding, as he calls it. He admitted when we’d established rapport that he had driven all over the state. He told me he was looking for his people, his own people. I believed him. I hated to send him to jail. But I thought six months in a controlled situation wouldgive him a chance to cool off, time to mature.”
    “Did it?”
    “In some ways. He finished his high-school education and did a lot of extra reading. But of course he still has problems to work out—if he’ll only give himself the time.”
    “Psychiatric problems?”
    “I prefer to call them life problems,” Belsize said. “He’s a boy who never really had anybody or anything of his own. That is a lot of not-having. I thought, myself, a psychiatrist could help him. But the psychologist who tested him for us didn’t think he’d be a good investment.”
    “Because he’s semi-psychotic?”
    “I don’t pin labels on young people. I see their adolescent storms. I’ve seen them take every form that you could find in a textbook of abnormal psychology. But often when the storms pass, they’re different and better people.” His hands turned over, palms upward, on the table.
    “Or different and worse.”
    “You’re a cynic, Mr. Archer.”
    “Not me. I was one of the ones who turned out different and better. Slightly better, anyway. I joined the cops instead of the hoods.”
    Belsize said with a smile that crumpled his whole face: “I still haven’t made my decision. My clients think I’m a cop. The cops think I’m a hood-lover. But we’re not the problem, are we?”
    “Do you have any idea where Davy would go?”
    “He might go anywhere at all. Have you talked to his employer? I don’t recall her name at the moment but she’s a redheaded woman—”
    “Laurel Smith. I talked to her. How did she get into the picture?”
    “She offered him a part-time job through our office. This was when he got out of jail about two months ago.”
    “Had she known him before?”
    “I don’t believe so. I think she’s a woman who wanted someone to help.”
    “And what did she expect in return?”
    “You are a cynic,” he said. “People often do good simply because it’s their nature. I think Mrs. Smith may have had troubles of her own.”
    “What makes you think so?”
    “I had an inquiry on her from the sheriff’s office in Santa Teresa. This was about the time that Davy got out of jail.”
    “An